


Rubber Bands

by Bright_Moon_Beam



Category: The Dolan Twins, Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Bickering, Blood and Gore, Bonding, Brotherly Love, Camping, Fighting, Gen, Horror, Medical Trauma, Mental Anguish, Mental Breakdown, Mental Health Issues, Psychological Horror, Scary, Sibling Bonding, Teasing, Therapy, Trauma, Twins, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Walks In The Woods
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-04
Updated: 2019-11-04
Packaged: 2021-01-22 13:43:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,283
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21303044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bright_Moon_Beam/pseuds/Bright_Moon_Beam
Summary: “He wasn’t what?” Grayson urged, looking at Ethan with an urgency, hitting his arm when he pursed his lips and stayed silent. “Ethan, what?” He demanded, bordering on frantic.“He wasn’t there. I know I sound insane, Gray, but the look in his eyes when he walked into the store was nothing. His eyes were looking straight into mine, but there was nothing behind them… no feeling…no—”“Soul,” Grayson finished for him, running his hands through his hair, taking in a deep, shaky breath. “He looked like he didn’t have a soul.”
Relationships: Ethan Dolan & Grayson Dolan, Ethan Dolan/Grayson Dolan
Comments: 11
Kudos: 18





	Rubber Bands

**Author's Note:**

> ... I'm sorry

“I can’t believe you sometimes,” Ethan snapped harshly, making Grayson flinch. “How could you forget something so important?” Grayson shrugged at his older brother’s question. Instinctively his left hand crawled across his own lap to his right wrist. His fingers clasped onto the band of rubber there. He pulled it up gently, but did not let it snap back down. He slowly moved the band down snuggly around his wrist. Ethan would get even more annoyed by the snapping sound.

“I didn’t mean to do it. If you weren’t rushing me this morning I wouldn’t have forgotten,” Grayson defended himself, never able to take his brothers criticism without a fight. He knew exactly where the flashlights were. He had laid them on the bed right beside his leg as he was packing his bag, meaning to put them in there was well. When Ethan called him to get in the car he had just gotten frazzled and forgotten them.

“So it’s my fault you forgot to do the one thing I trusted you to do?” Ethan asked incredulously, his eyes narrowed. The stop light they were waiting at when the flashlights came into discussion had turned green, but Ethan was too busy glaring at Grayson to notice and Grayson didn’t bother to point it out to him. It’s not like there was anyone behind them anyway. These back roads were always practically deserted. 

“Yep,” he said nonchalantly, tipping his chin up and avoiding Ethan’s gaze, “I don’t know why it is such a big deal anyway. They have flashlights at the camping store right down the street from our site. It’s not like they are going to be outrageously expensive or anything.”

“That’s not the point, Gray,” Ethan had finally turned away from him and started to drive down the long winding road towards Whipporwill, “you need to start taking responsibility.” Ethan’s voice was soft, the anger previously there no longer present, and Grayson could no longer find the will to do anything but be ashamed. He really hadn’t meant to forget the flashlights and he wished Ethan would recognize that. This trip was supposed to help them bond again, not make them fight.

They had always been close. When you were a twin it was kind of a given that you would form a special bond. Ethan had been born first and almost 20 minutes later, after some birthing complications, Grayson came. From that moment on they had been together. They were an inseparable duo and everyone accepted it. They were each other’s best friends and they wouldn’t want to have it any other way. They took all the same classes and played all the same sports. They were each other’s wingmen with the girls and their shoulder to cry on when they were rejected. Grayson would say they were the two closest people in the entire world and he really meant that. No one could love anyone as much as he loved Ethan. Even if they argued multiple times every single day, even if Ethan was lazy and never cleaned up after himself, even if Grayson was annoying and occasionally way too clingy, they were together from day one and no one could beat that.

Grayson had never been ashamed of the bond they had. For most of his life he hadn’t   
even thought about it. It wasn’t anything special to him because it was simply his reality— that is until it wasn’t. There father had been diagnosed with cancer when they were 15. They both knew it was bad. They learned about cancer enough in school to be scared, but it didn’t really hit them at first. Their dad still looked the same. He acted the way he always did, he joked around with them the way he always did. He went on like absolutely nothing had changed at all other than the weekly doctor's appointments he was now subjected to, and that made it easy to forget. 

The pain he must have endured silently haunted Grayson. He had hidden it from them to keep them happy until he physically couldn’t anymore. Until his skin was sallow, his eyes dark and sunken, his body slimming until he looked merely like a suit of skin draped over fragile bones. The cancer took him over and the summer before their senior year of Highschool. 

Senior year had passed in an agonizing blur. The twins had never been without   
their father and they didn’t know how to cope. Rather than finding solace in the other like they always would before, a rift grew between them. Grayson watched his brother from the sidelines craving his attention, yet unable to reach out so caught up in his own turmoil. His grades plummeted. He couldn’t focus on his school work to save his life and homework was torture. Everything felt foreign to him. The basic had become impossible and his mother was too busy grieving herself to try and help him.

Grayson only wished she wasn’t so lost that she couldn’t help Ethan. Where Grayson had turned quiet his brother had turned violent. The night their father died he had smashed a window in the living room with his fist and had to get ten stitches in his hand. That had set the pace for the rest of the year. Anyone who said anything remotely provocative to Ethan was likely to get hit. Ethan had stopped caring about disciplinary measures and only after he was one strike away from not being able to graduate did Ethan start to change. Grayson knew he wasn’t feeling any better, but he stopped taking his anger out physically at least.  
Grayson had wanted to check on him. He had wanted to see if he was alright and to see if he found a healthier method to cope, but he was ashamed of himself. He was ashamed of how far he had fallen and to hear Ethan’s criticism because his own path to graduation was becoming more and more obstructed under everyone’s noses. It wasn’t until the school called that things really exploded though.

Their mother had picked up the phone at dinner and Grayson watched,  
nervously snapping the rubber band fast and hard against his wrist under the table. His grief counselor had suggested the technique to keep him focused right after his dad's death and Grayson often found himself playing with the band. It never seemed to really help, but he couldn’t stop.

“Gray, cut that shit out.It’s annoying.” Ethan snapped. They had barely spoken two words to each other the entire dinner, but of course Ethan could get over his chronic brooding silence if it meant he could criticize Carson.

“Shut up,” Grayson growled, snapping the band harder even though it really hurt just so that it would be louder. His eyes wandered away from Ethan to their mother again. She was leaning against the island, her lips pressed into a tight line, her cell phone pressed firmly to her ear. Grayson just knew it was about him. He could see the way her eyes kept wondering to him. After she hung up, her cheeks red, and her eyes blazing, Grayson knew he was really in for it.

“Grayson Dolan, please tell me why the school just called to tell me you are in danger of having to repeat your senior year?” Her voice was stern and almost foreign. She had lost a lot of her fire after her husband had died and Grayson felt even more awful to be the one to bring just a little bit of that spark back.

“Mom, I’m sorry,” he started, wanting to explain even though it’s not really like he had an excuse, “I’m trying. I swear I am.”

“Grayson, if you were really trying we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now,” she snapped. She picked up the dinner she had barely touched, dropping it into the sink harshly, making Grayson flinch. His fingers curled around the band on his wrist as he stared down at his plate, his cheeks burning in shame. He could feel Ethan’s eyes on him but he refused to look over.

“I’ll get my English grade up. I promise you that is all that it is. I’ll talk to my teacher about it or something. Maybe get a tutor.” 

“As If,” Ethan mumbled. It was barely there, but Grayson heard him anyway and immediately his head snapped up and over to the side to glare at a smug looking Ethan.

“Shut up!” He cried out, not in the mood for his brother to act all high and mighty now.

“No! You know it’s bullshit! You will go to school and sit in class and do absolutely nothing just like you have been doing,” Ethan spat.

“How would you even know? You never even talk to me in school anymore. You have no idea what I do!” 

“I don't need to talk to you to know how much of an idiot you are though,” Ethan hissed, his lips curled up in a smile like he had already won the argument. Grayson reacted without thinking, blinded by his rage at his brother’s hypocrisy. He slammed his fist right into Ethan’s cheek not caring about the consequence because he couldn’t take it anymore. He couldn’t take Ethan’s judgment when he was falling apart in his own way too. He wouldn’t sit here and be called an idiot when the reason he was so distracted was because he felt like he lost his brother on top of his father, and Ethan didn’t seem to care at all when Grayson missed him every single day. 

He knew it was a bad idea, but it felt good to release the rage and anger he had let well up inside of him. Ethan gave him a black eye afterward, but when he was sitting in his room, grounded, with a bag of frozen peas draped across his face he still felt it was worth it. 

Their fight had been painful and left ugly dark bruises that neither one of them wanted to explain, but it exposed the underlying tension they were both trying to conceal. Something had to be done and after the stress of college applications was done and they both graduated on very thin ice they planned this trip.

Camping had always been something they did with their father. He was a really outdoorsy type guy before he had gotten sick. They went hiking, fishing, and every summer without fail they went camping multiple times. It was their father and son bonding activity and last summer they hadn’t been able to go out all. Grayson had missed it and he missed spending time with Ethan even when he was a jerk so he had thought about asking him. He had been too hesitant to rush it and bring up something that would make Ethan sad and then consequently angry. Their twin bond had come to the rescue though. Ethan had turned the tables and came to him sheepishly one evening asking him if he wanted to go to Whippoorwill, the campsite they had been going to since they were children.

Grayson tried not to show how thrilled he was as he casually agreed and now, two days later, they were about 10 minutes away from the site already fighting about something as trivial as flashlights. After Ethan had made him feel like an irresponsible dumbass he didn’t say a word until they pulled into the parking lot next to an older dodge truck. 

The small decrepit shack the camp ground tried to call a camp store was small and drab and basically blended into the woods it stood in front of. In the 19 years they had been coming it still looked exactly the same. The little wooden box was plastered in all kinds of signs advertising fishing gear and camping supplies, but they looked like they were at least a hundred years old, the sun having scorched the bright colors to faint tints and the the passing cars kicking up enough dust and grime to cover them in a fine layer of filth. Grayson doubted the store carried anything they advertised, but he knew they would have flashlights and that is all that mattered. 

“Because you forgot the flashlights you can be the one to get them,” Ethan said gruffly, pulling his phone out of his pocket, staring down at it blankly. Grayson turned to look at him a bit surprised, fiddling with his hands in his lap.

“Seriously, E?” He whined, looking at the shack before looking back at him. “It’s gross in there and the man behind the counter has to be at least 100 years old. He creeps me out.” 

“Stop being such a baby!” Ethan teased finally looking over at him, a small albeit genuine smile on his lips. It seemed like it came out of nowhere and Grayson groaned loudly when his brother reached over to ruffle his hair. “Are you really scared of that old dude? You could knock him over if you exhaled a deep breath too close to him.”

“Dude please, he seriously gives me the creeps. He stares at you the whole time you are in the the store and he does that gross old dude thing where he licks his lips a thousand times per minute.” He shuddered at the thought, his cheeks turning pink at Ethan’s loud laughter.

“He really does. He looks like a lizard.” Ethan joked, poking his tongue out to swipe it across his bottom lip quickly, just to make Grayson cringe. “Just like that right?” He got closer to Grayson’s face and even though Grayson wanted to be mad and grossed out, he couldn’t help but laugh, shoving his brother away playfully. He missed joking around with him like this. He missed Ethan teasing him rather than picking him apart.

“Stop it, weirdo. Just hurry up and come with me so we can get this over with,” Grayson said, still chuckling as he opened the door and stepped out onto the pavement. He heard Ethan murmur something under his breath as he shut the door, but nonetheless his twin stepped out of the drivers side a minute later and walked right beside him to the door.

The air they were met with when they stepped inside was musty and hard to breathe. The space was so small, and it was horribly lit. The only window in the building was a small one behind the counter and it had been broken long ago. Two boards criss-crossing the jagged glass topped off with thick brown curtains that probably had once been white. Grayson felt a little sick because of how stuffy it was. He rubbed his nose with the back of his hand gingerly, sticking close to Ethan as his brother led the charge down the first aisle in search of flashlights in the midst of trinkets and fishing flies.

Neither of them bothered to spare the old withered man behind the counter a glance, but Grayson swore he heard the sound of his aged lips cracking open with a wet chewing sound following. It made all the hairs on his arm stand on end, and he started walking faster,wanting nothing more than to get out.

“Just relax,” Ethan soothed, stopping so suddenly in front of some dusty shelves that Grayson almost ran into him. He grimaced as he pulled out a filthy flashlight, examining it carefully. 

“Can’t you hear that?” Grayson asked, shoving his hands in his pocket. “It sounds disgusting!”

“Hear What?” Ethan replied confused, looking away from the dust covered yellow plastic to glance at Grayson. Grayson was going to explain, yet he was cut off when the bell above the door rang, and the shuffle of heavy boots on the hardwood floors filled the tiny space. No one else had ever come into the store when they were there. Ever. 

Grayson wasn’t facing the door, but he watched Ethan’s face. He watched as his brother’s dark eyes narrowed and he almost jumped when Ethan reached out to grab his arm, pulling him a bit closer.   
“Ethan?” He questioned, his voice barely above a whisper.  
“Shh,” Ethan hissed, shaking his head before grabbing another flashlight and moving forward. Grayson knew he would explain later so he followed him silently, but he couldn’t shake the awful feeling in his gut. He felt dizzy as he followed Ethan and he could hear the people that had just entered loud and clear. They were horsing around in the corner by the snack aisle. Grayson could hear them talking and just from their voices he could tell they were intoxicated. They were too loud, too brash, and all their words seemed to slur together. Grayson’s eyes were trained on the ground and out of his peripheral he could see three pairs of legs. All of the men were in some variation of blue jeans and dark work boots. He wanted to look up and see their faces. He was curious, painfully so, yet he couldn’t make himself. His head wouldn’t move and the harder he tried to make himself look the worse the feeling got. 

When they got to the counter his eyes darted up and straightforward to the old man. The old man's mouth was in a tight line as he reached out to grab the flashlight and Grayson’s stomach did backflips as his wrinkled and age-spot infested hands all but inched across the counter. His own hands itched with anticipation. They needed to leave. He knew they really needed to leave and they couldn’t until the dumb flashlights were rung up. 

“Look what we have here boys. I think I’m so drunk im seeing double.” Grayson jumped at the loud voice, his head snapping instinctively towards it, and then finally he saw them. The man who had spoken to him was leering at him. His face was darkened from hours in the sun and his dark long hair was matted to his forehead with sweat. His appearance really didn’t differ much from any of the drunk farmers sons’ that liked to terrorize the backwoods of New Jersey, but his eyes attracted Gray's attention right away. They were set far back in his face, making them appear small and beady, but they were not dark. They were a light blue color, standing out starkly against his tan skin. They were staring right into Grayson’s. The man’s pupils were huge as he looked at him too. They took Gray’s breath away and he felt his heart begin to hammer against his ribs.

“I see ‘em too,” The man to his left said. His hair was light, and his eyes were big and brown like a cow’s. He would have been inherently less intimidating if not for the fact that his neck was tilted to the side— almost like it had been snapped. “So they are real or we are both just really drunk,” He said it and then laughed like a hyena, his bent neck bouncing with the force of it. Grayson felt nauseated at the sight, biting down on his bottom lip.  
“They are real and you are both really drunk.” The final man supplied, his voice deep and his expression stoic. He was taller than both the other men and his face was completely devoid of emotion.

“We are identical twins.” Ethan said from Grayson’s side. His voice was loud and clear, a warning held within it. He wasn’t playing around and Grayson knew it was because he was scared. 

“Twins huh?” The first man said, his thin lips parting as he grinned, revealing his slimy yellow teeth. His blue eyes still bore into Grayson’s. “You two campin’ down the road?” He questioned. 

“We heard the camp grounds are real nice around here.” the bent neck blonde added, wagging an ancient snickers bar at them that he was clutching in his hands. 

“We are just passing through,”Ethan said again. Grayson was so thankful his brother was doing all the talking because he was all choked up. He couldn’t even talk if he wanted to. 

“A shame.” The blue eyed man said, taking a step closer, “Young boys like you should be out having fun.” He laughed a humourless laugh and he was so close that Grayson could smell his putrid alcohol breath.He watched in silent terror as the man reached out with dirt caked fingernails, his large calloused hand closing around his wrist. 

“You should stop that. It ain't good for ya.” The man whispered with a smile. Grayson yanked his hand out of the man’s grip, his heart in his stomach as he stumbled back. He had been pulling on the rubberband the entire time. The skin on his wrist was screaming at him, red and irritated, yet he hadn’t even noticed until now. He opened his mouth to speak, but his mouth felt as if it was full of cotton. He merely squeaked out a pathetic noise before Ethan was slinging his arm around his shoulders and forcibly guiding him out. 

He stumbled with his brother as if he had been the one drinking. As soon as they stepped back into the fresh air and sunlight, he gulped down mouthfuls of air, choking on it in his hurry to fill his lungs. He coughed harshly into his elbow, feeling horrifically dizzy. He wanted to stop, but Ethan wouldn’t let him, continuing to drag him to the car until they were at the passenger side. Ethan helped him into his seat as he continued to cough before shutting the door and running around the car to get into the drivers side.  
“Ethan,” Grayson gasped, groping around in duffle bag at his feet, desperately trying to find his inhaler. He hadn’t had an asthma attack in years, yet now his throat felt closed as if a hand was wrapped around it, squeezing tight with no intention of letting go.

“What the hell was that?” Ethan said angrily, taking his keys from his pocket, trying to jam them into the ignition. Grayson glanced over, watching his brother shake violently, missing the ignition everytime he tried. 

“Ethan,” He gasped again, his hand finally coming in contact with the familiar plastic of his life line. He yanked it up and put it to his lips, breathing in the medicinal mist with relish. 

“What the hell!” Ethan roared, slamming his fist down on the wheel in anger before finally getting the key in and turning it, speeding out of the parking lot. Grayson could only close his eyes, acclimating himself to the sensation breathing again before taking another small puff. When his lungs were functioning normally enough he finally spoke, rubbing his irritated wrist almost methodically.

“They were just some drunkard weirdos,” He rationalized, “they wanted to freak us out and probably rob the old man or something. We were just unlucky enough to run into them.” It felt like much more than that. He could still remember the feeling of the man's hand on him and the look in his eye. Every part of it screamed danger, yet they had escaped unharmed and that was all that mattered. They were going to go camping and it was going to be fine. Nothing more than a funny memory to look back on in the future. 

“You didn’t see the way he looked at us when we first walked in,” Ethan said, his voice suddenly going quiet. He was going several miles over the speed limit, but once again Grayson didn’t have it in him to say a word about it. “It wasn’t...He wasn’t--” He struggled to speak and Gray’s chest started to burn again.

“He wasn’t what?” Grayson urged, looking at Ethan with an urgency, hitting his arm when he pursed his lips and stayed silent. “Ethan, what?” He demanded, bordering on frantic.

“He wasn’t… there. I know I sound insane, Gray, but the look in his eyes when he walked into the store was nothing. His eyes were looking straight into mine, but there was nothing behind them… no feeling…no—”

“Soul,” Grayson finished for him, running his hands through his hair, taking in a deep shaky breath. “He looked like he didn’t have a soul.”  
___________

When they pulled into the camp ground they didn’t move for a long time. They were losing daylight hours, and they needed to set up the tent before it got too dark, but neither of them wanted to leave the car. When they were with their dad they had never been scared to camp. Even if there were bears lurking in the trees or giant bugs roaming the ground, they had their dad to fight off everything. 

Their dad was no longer there though. He couldn’t hold their hands or wipe their tears and he surely couldn’t fend off anything that came for them in the woods. What would he say if he could see them now? How angry would he feel to see how far they had fallen and how they had let fear rule their lives. The men in the camping store were nothing but a memory, and they had a silent agreement to make it through at least one night. 

When the sun was already sitting on the tops of the trees, threatening to sink into the dimness of evening, Grayson and Ethan finally climbed out of the car and set up the tent together. They worked as a team to put it up and they continued to work together to start the fire and cook dinner as well. It was supposed to be relaxing and they both pretended it was, but neither of them could shake the awful feeling. With every crackle of the fire they jumped. When the wind blew too loud Grayson imagined the men in the rustling trees. The blue eyed mans unsettling blank eyes watching them, tracking them. Both of their food sat practically untouched, and as soon as the sun set they both crawled into the tent. 

“I won’t be able to sleep,” Grayson whispered. He held one of the flashlights they bought in his hands, using the lowest setting to create just enough light to be able to see his brothers face. “I hate this, Ethan. I really hate this.”

“Me too,” Ethan answered. There was no facade anymore. Ethan couldn’t feign nonchalance and Grayson saw the fear welling in his own chest mirrored in his brothers practically identical eyes. 

“I wish I knew what dad would do if he was here,” Gray admitted. He laid the flashlight down on the ground of the tent and reached down for the band on his wrist, but Ethan grabbed his hand before he had a chance to start snapping it. 

“Gray” Ethan began to speak, but Grayson cut him off.

“We aren’t little kids anymore. Why can’t we just act like it? Why can’t we get over this? Get over anything?” His voice cracked and he felt the tears he had been holding back all day start to well up in his eyes. 

“We are allowed to be scared, Gray.” Ethan snapped, surprising Grayson. “We are allowed to be scared of the dark, and things in the woods, and creepy rednecks trying to feel you up in the goddamn health hazard of a camp store.” He held onto Grayson’s wrist so tight it almost hurt, but Grayson liked it. Liked the ground force of it. The reminder that Ethan was still right beside him. “We are allowed to be sad that dad died. We are allowed to feel all messed up about it, and confused, and we are allowed to miss him.”

The tears started streaming Grayson’s face. He could have sworn he caught glimpses of tears on his brothers cheeks as well in the dim light. 

“What we aren’t allowed to do is bottle it all in and ignore each other and act like idiots which is all we have been doing.” He said firmly, and Grayson opened his mouth to agree, but no words came out.

Right next to the tent a twig snapped. The crisp sound rang through the air as clear as day in the silent forest, and Grayson went rigid. Ethan let go of his wrist immediately and grabbed the flashlight, turning it off and leaving them in the pitch black. Grayson covered his mouth with his hands, counting to ten in his mind to stop the hyperventilating before it came. There was nothing and if there was something breathing louder than a window fan on the highest setting wasn’t going to help.

He kept his head still and his eyes closed, listening for any other noises, but there was nothing but the scream of the cicadas and the small click of his brother pocket knife. He had made fun of him for taking it on every camping trip, but now he was thankful for it. 

“We are getting out of here,” Ethan whispered, “right now.” 

“Okay,” Grayson agreed easily. He was so over the stupid camping trip and after another few minutes of silence they both grabbed their flashlights and prepared to make a run for the truck. Grayson held his breath as Ethan unzipped the tent, the noise seemingly outrageously loud in the silence of the night. He stuck close to his twin as they moved out of the tent and he held onto the back of his shirt as he turned all the way around to scan the area quickly. Grayson felt relieved to see nothing, but he still ran just as fast as Ethan did towards the car.

The door handle of the car was in his sight. He was so close to being able to just reach out and grab it. He heard the drivers side door open, but just before he could reach, his foot hit something hard and he was falling forward, his face rocketing towards the ground. His flashlight flew out of his hands and into the brush at the edge of the forest, and for a moment he lay still, feeling disoriented. He had smacked his head off the hard ground, and he briefly wondered if he was concussed. He didn’t have much time to think though, the urgency of the situation catching up to him.

He struggled to his knees, glancing back idly to try and see what he had tripped on instinctively. Unlike the root or the rock he had been expecting, there was a woman’s leg, twisted at an odd angle. She was completely naked and undeniably dead. Her face, that had probably once been beautiful, was lulled to the side and while Grayson was no expert the bloated and yellowed color of her skin told him she had been dead long before he had stumbled across her. He opened his mouth in a silent scream, her blank eyes seeming to be staring into his own. He felt light headed as he realized that half of her head was missing. There was a mass of congealed blood and chunked brain matter where she was supposed to have a skull and Grayson had to tear his eyes away as his stomach churned dangerously fast and his mouth began to water. He scrambled to get onto his feet, tears starting to cloud his vision, but he was stopped by a large boot slamming down on his back.

A scream finally tore from his lips as he heard a crack, and he crumpled back into the dirt in agony. He writhed as he screamed, unable to think of much else but the pain.

“I thought you boys said you weren’t coming to the camp ground?” He recognized the blue eyed man’s voice immediately and started to cry harder, struggling fruitlessly under his boot. “It’s not nice to lie and now you have yourself in a predicament, boy.” He grabbed Grayson by the hair and yanked his head back harshly, slapping some duct tape over his mouth before he could scream again. 

Off in the distance he could hear something rustling, yet the man’s labored breathing was loud and right in his ear. It made it impossible to concentrate on anything else. Grayson continued to struggle even though the man was stronger than him, unable to accept this as the end. The car was still only a few feet away and Ethan was still somewhere close. He swore he could feel his presence there and if he could just get to him this would all be over.   
“This lady here,” The blue eyed man began, a far off tone to his voice. “She was just like you. She was a no good liar.” he stepped off of Grayson’s back and directly after Grayson started to flail. He needed to move, he needed to get up and run or even crawl, yet his legs were frozen in place not even so much as twitching. They were completely numb. They were dead weights now and he screamed into the sticky adhesive over his mouth as he tried to drag himself forward with his hands. 

“First she said she needed a ride the whole way to Maryland and me and my boys always oblige.” His voice took an angry turn and Grayson felt his nails rip back as he tried to find purchase in nothing but flat dirt and small pebbles. He flinched when he heard a loud thump, glancing back to see the man dragging the woman’s mangled corpse across the dirt and into the brush, presumably dumping her in a hole they had dug who knows how long ago. They had been romping around in the woods with her corpse, boozing up for days. Grayson and Ethan has merely been unlucky enough to stumble upon them. “She wanted out after about only a mile though. We weren’t anywhere near Maryland so I know she just didn’t like us very much.” He cackled and Grayson looked away, trying harder to drag himself forward while his entire body was shaking with sobs. He made it a few inches before the man’s disgusting murderous hands were back on him. He couldn’t feel them, because there was no feeling at all in his legs, but he felt himself being dragged backwards his bleeding fingers leaving trails in the dirt as he was brought closer to the hole.

“We don’t like that. We really don’t, but Sawyer had always liked pretty girls so you wanna know what we did?” He dropped Grayson’s feet down in the hole and Grayson dug into the dirt with every ounce of strength he had left in his fingertips to keep himself from falling in. 

“We blew a big hole in her pretty head just for him. He likes ‘em better when they can’t move anyway.” He cackled again and stepped forward, using his steel toed boots to break Grayson’s fingers like he was putting out a cigarette butt. Grayson could see absolutely nothing in his eyes. Nothing at all. 

His body crashed down on top of the woman’s, and he could do nothing as a wooden lid   
was thrown down on top of him, closing out the already minuscule light they had been getting from the moon. He pushed up on the lid weakly, dry heaving as his already broken fingers failed to be anything but useless. He could smell the rotting woman beneath him, and he gagged as he continued to push, his upset stomach too empty to produce anything.

No matter how hard he pushed the wood wouldn’t budge and through his panic he could   
hear a shovel dig into the ground and the loud thud of dirt as it was thrown on top of the wood over and over. He was being buried alive and he was too weak to get himself out. He let out a pained scream, pounding on the box in the dark with all the might left, but all the sound was muffled. The tape over his mouth was not only quieting his screams, but it was making the increasingly heavy and nauseous air even harder to breathe with his compromised lungs. His chest was burning as his heart worked triple time, but still his body started to fail him, and his throat started to close. He could feel the hand around it. He swore he could feel the calloused, dirt crusted hands of the blue eyed man clenching around his neck, squeezing tighter and tighter as the darkness started to consume him.

His hands eventually fell onto his stomach because he didn’t have enough strength to   
keep them up and he wheezed miserably, suffocating in the rotten little hole. His cheeks stung from the acrid stream of never ending tears and he felt the true blackness tug at the corner of his vision trying to suck him in and keep him there forever. He knew Ethan was still out there. He was so close, only a few Inches away with those animals and he wanted nothing more than to see his twin’s face. In the moment, he did the only thing he could think to do.  
——————  
Ethan had the door handle of their car gripped tightly in his hand, and he was a second away from ripping it open when someone lunged at him. His own frantic footsteps as he bolted to the car as well as Gray's had concealed any other sounds so he hadn’t even heard the man approach. He only realized his presence when an arm was wrapped around his neck cutting off his air supply. He gasped weakly in shock, the smell of alcohol flooding his nose again, the flashlight he had been clutching tightly falling to the ground.

“I got you,” a leering voice cooed. Ethan choked when he tightened his arm, making   
it even harder for him to breathe. He squirmed, gasping like a fish out of water in desperate in need of some more oxygen. The man held firm though and a moment later he went completely still as the safety of a gun was clicked off and the barrel was nestled against his temple. “Just relax, I already got you so just accept it.” Ethan closed his eyes still gasping, visualizing a face with the voice. The man in the store. The one with a bent neck.

“Boss doesn’t like liars,” he taunted, pushing the gun more firmly against Ethan’s   
skull. “Should I blow your head off now or should I wait?” He pondered the question in silence for a moment as Ethan felt his face turn red. His legs were shaking so harshly that the man’s hold around his neck was the only thing keeping him standing. “I like to watch it go through the whole way. It’s most fun for sure.” He mused.

Ethan felt the sweat rolling down his face, and his mind raced as he tried to come up with what he should do. Everything was blank though, his mind unable to move past the feeling of the cold metal of the gun inches away from one of his most vital organs.

The heard the noise, his brothers scream, muffled but unmistakable, and his eyes shot open. Before he could think about the consequences of what could go wrong, he threw his elbow back, landing a sharp jab into the man's ribs. The bent necked man let out a yelp and his grip loosened just enough that Ethan could slip out. He turned as quickly as he could, making a grab for the gun that sent them both to the ground. 

“Goddamnit kid!” The man wrestled with him on the ground, and Ethan knew his   
odds weren’t good, yet he fought. He fought with everything he had had because Grayson was his younger brother. He was his responsibility and he needed to protect him. The man was taller than he was, but he wasn’t all that strong and despite taking several blows to the face he managed to get the gun from his hands. 

He had never even held a gun before. The cold metal felt foreign and dangerous in   
his hands as he jumped to his feet and backed up. The bent necked man looked wild. His blond thin hair was a mess, his face scratched from their fight. He was feral and Ethan’s hands were still shaking as he pointed the gun. He didn’t know if he could do it. He didn’t know of he could pull the trigger, but then the man smiled, his lips parting to display a sea of yellow teeth. He took half a step towards Ethan, and he pulled the trigger, watching horrified at the blood that started to gush for the wound in his chest. He couldn’t rip his eyes away as he fell to the ground.

“Sawyer, What did I tell you about being quiet! I told ya’ not to shoot him.” Ethan’s   
head jerked to the side to see the blue eyed man staring at him. He pivoted his body pointing his gun right at the mans face.

“You killed Sawyer,” the man said apathetically, “you really done it.” 

“Where is my brother?” Ethan snarled, tears starting to well up in his eyes.

“Hiding,” the man said simply, the corners of his lips curling up into a disgusting smile. 

“Tell me where he is now!” Ethan demanded, the tears starting to stream down his cheeks, “where the hell is my brother?”

“That’s the game! You gotta find ‘em.” He started to laugh then, the same awful   
laugh as before and Ethan swore he saw red. He yanked the trigger again, staring straight into the man's empty eyes as the blood started to pour from the hole in his head, and he dropped to the ground. Ethan let out a sob, dropping the gun and darting towards the side of the car where the man had come from. 

“Grayson!” He screamed, desperately fumbling in the dark. “Gray, where are   
you?” He stumbled into the woods blindly, his heart beat roaring in his ears as he tried to make out anything abnormal in the dark. Then he heard a familiar noise. The snap of a rubber band.

“Gray! I can hear the rubber band! Keep going!” He cried out, dropping down on all fours, listening to the sound. 

Snap

He felt along the ground urgently as the snaps became louder and louder as well   
as more frequent. 

Snap, snap, snap 

“Gray!” He wheezed, feeling the fresh loose dirt between his fingers. He started   
digging furiously. “I’m here, Gray! I’m here so hold on just a little bit longer!” He felt his fingers break through the soft earth onto something hard. Then he felt something else hard slam down into the back of his head. He fell forward helplessly with a gasp, his body going slack. He felt warmth dripping down the back of his head to the base of the skull, and he watched silently as a shovel was dropped and the third pair of boots that he had forgotten all about walked away back towards the car. 

There was a distinct ringing in both of his ears, clouding his head like radio static, yet loud and clear he could hear it.

Snap, snap, snap, snap...snap…… snap. 

The snaps slowed and then the snaps stopped. He had never felt more empty in his entire life in that moment. He opened his mouth the call out to his brother, but before he could force the words from his lips the darkness crawling in from the corners of his vision closed up around him, and he was nothing.

**Author's Note:**

> I was supposed to post this on Halloween but I'm late per usual. I had to write a horror story for my creative writing class last year and my crackhead self just made a thinly veiled Dolan twins fic that is beyond depressing. One of my very best friends loves this story for some reason and insisted that I post it so if you are depressed after this you can blame her too. (Love you Jules<3)
> 
> This is loosely based on a true story of a woman who was found murdered in New Jersey.
> 
> PleAse feel free to comment and yell at me for my awfulness because when I was reading over it to edit out any mistakes I could find I made /myself/ anxious and upset.
> 
> Hopefully I will have my next request filled soon 
> 
> :))))))))


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